Inside MMA TV report: Ronda & Cain

Saturday, 03 August 2013 10:06

***This week, Ronda reveals an interesting twist on what prevents friendship with Miesha Tate, who she marks out for, and another rant on Cyborg. Also, Rory MacDonald gives his side of the awful fight with Jake Ellenberger, Ray Sefo reveals why he’s fighting again, plus King Mo talks avenging his KO loss. All this and much more, this week on Inside MMA Live!***

They run down the card from Rio De Janeiro, Brazil headlined by UFC Featherweight champion Jose Aldo defending against “The Korean Zombie” Chan Sung Jung. Also Lyoto Machida faces Phil Davis, and Thales Leites, Thiago Santos, and Vinny Magalhaes are also on the main card.

If Aldo wins he will tie Jon Jones’ current consecutive streak of title defenses with five. For Aldo to win Bas says to do what he always does, defend the takedown and use his superior striking to try to drop his opponent. Jung is a tough guy but this is Aldo we’re talking about. Jung has great striking and reflexes, but he has great counters with those reflexes. He needs to mix things up with fakes to move in for a great punch or takedown. Sometimes when a really good striker doesn’t think the -other is as good, they can get caught, sort of like how Kevin Randleman caught Mirko Cro-Cop. So Zombie might have a chance in that respect.

As for Davis-Machida, Lyoto needs to do what he always does and not add anything, but change things up a little bit, but he must avoid takedowns. Davis needs to come from higher to go for that takedown. Davis, while not a great striker, should use his striking and long reach to set up takedowns, as Jon Jones was able to use his length to his advantage over Lyoto as well.

They show a clip from the weigh-ins when Ian McCall was weighed, we all got to see his dastardly thin curled moustache, which he frequently sports. But when he went to face off with his opponent, Illiarde Santos, when he turned to face McCall, he was suddenly wearing a fake curly moustache too! He couldn’t contain himself and chuckled at Santos.

Tito Ortiz vs. Rampage Jackson

Kenny sets this up talking about the theme of fighters who hang on too long and how you can never tell a guy he needs to retire. They show the clip of the Tito Ortiz reveal and faceoff for Bellator. Kenny rubs in they are 0-6 combined in their last group of fights. Bas is more hopeful that with a big company like Viacom behind them who knows?

They run a graphic and Kenny explains how difficult this will be because the expenses of fighter purses, production, advertising, and miscellaneous costs should run about $4.5 million, with an expected gate/sponsorship revenue at about $750k, bringing a total expense of $3.75 million. To break even would require 145,000 buys, assuming UFC price scale. Bas thinks Ortiz and Jackson can do it. (Good ol’ Bas.)

Bellator Results

They run down the rest of the fights in highlight form including:

--Patricio Pitbull over Jared Downing

--Mo Lawal over Jacob Noe

--Ben Askren over Andrey Koreshkov

--Michael Chandler over David Rickels

Bas laughs at how Askren beats his opponents the same way with takedown and mauling while holding them down that Askren says he doesn’t have to hide his game plan at all, he fights the same way for everyone but he’s so good at doing it he doesn’t have to hide it. Kenny points out this was Askren’s last fight under contract with Bellator and wonders what his future holds?

King Mo Lawal LIVE

The King joins us on the big screen live from his “castle” in Las Vegas. He will face either Attila Vegh or Emmanuel Newton next. It felt good to get that victory out of the way. He tried to stand with him, but as a tribute to wrestling there in New Mexico with the USA team there he wanted to show his takedowns. Newton, the guy who knocked Lawal out this year, faces Attila Vegh for the LHW belt, and King says he is rooting for the “Black Skinhead” in that fight. It will be a totally different fight in their rematch, he wants to punish and torture him for about three or four rounds and then stop him in the last. He’s watched that fight but he writes it off as not a big deal since he simply overcommitted to his shots. Everyone thinks he had his hands down but he was loading up his fight hand and when he tried to bring it back to his chin he threw the spinning backfist and landed it. Newton was celebrating so hard because he didn’t expect it to happen with his “ugly ass dance” he always does. The new fight will be totally different. He won’t get Newton unless he wins, since he faces the winner so he’ll wait to see what happens. (Maybe since he’s been hanging around TNA so much he can hit Vegh with a chair so he gets his Newton revenge rematch!)

The Final Bell: UFC on FOX

They run down the results of the entire card headlined by Demetrious Johnson’s defense against John Moraga. Bas loved Robbie Lawler’s kicks, which didn’t telegraph at all yet still had power behind it. But in a new segment for IMMA they pose some questions pertaining to this show:

--Do flyweights belong on the main event?

Bas thinks it was an amazing fight, DJ was all over the place, and was a real good fight and thinks they deserve their spot where it was.

--Is Rory MacDonald ready for a title fight?

Two weeks ago Rory was top ten for Bas, and understands why Rory fought the way he did, safe.

The Canadian Serial Killer LIVE

Rory joins us on the big screen looking from Vancouver, looking every part the Canadian Serial Killer, with his haircut and glasses straight from the fifties, and his calm demeanor. He felt the fight went well. Obviously he would’ve liked some more action but he did what he had to do, but unfortunately Jake felt more comfortable sitting back and getting picked away and didn’t want to take any risks. Even when he had the first two rounds and Jake was in a position of having to take a risk, he wasn’t willing to do that and the fight ended the way it did. He wanted to finish him, but he thinks he was well on his way to doing that in another round or two.

Rory fought his first fight at 16 and it was legal as far as he knows as he was signed up with the commission and everything. (I guess anything goes in Canada!)

They show a graphic of “Rory the Reticent’s” first ten fights where he was undefeated with all finishes, then following his loss to Carlos Condit in 2010, he began training with GSP, and is since 5-0, but with three decisions. He says does and he doesn’t think about that. He does listen to some of the criticism in that regard but understands that not everyone will be happy with a performance. He sees the issue in this bout, was needing more time to finish the fight and figures if he had that, and did, people would have a different opinion of this fight. Sometimes with a top notch opponent like Ellenberger, it takes a little while longer.

Bas asks what he does in his sparetime, and Rory says he doesn’t really do anything else. It’s a full time job at the gym. Maybe a vacation here and there, to see family in BC, but he lives in Montreal so he just focuses on fighting. Kenny tries to trap him and wonders if he sits around with GSP after training and thinks, “Hmm wonder what that fight would be like?”. Rory is like “uh, no.” (in a sorry to disappoint you sorta way.)

Kenny and Bas both feel he deserves a title shot. Bas reveals his entire strategy to his questions was to find out if Rory really was a psychotic serial killer and he researched ahead of time. The first test was to check for circumlocution, which is when you flip and dance around answers, which he didn’t do. The second test was that many sociopaths have charm and he’s not sure if Rory was charming or not, but he forgot to ask Rory if he killed any small animals when he was kid. (Only in UFC can you have gimmicks for being zombies and serial killers and be taken seriously. Simply awesome …)

Lion Fight Highlights

--Tiffany Van Soest over the much taller Lucy Payne (what a fantastic name for a female fighter!)

--Yodsanklai Fairtex over Chike Lindsay.

As a sidenote, in both of these fights, the championship belts were both comically too big for the fighters…

Bas breaks down the unusual and effective combinations Tiffany unleashed on Payne to finish this fight. They then reveal how Tiffany sent Bas a picture of who she worked on this with, and it was none other than Anderson Silva. Bas wonders if Steven Seagal is who taught him those moves to teach her. (It all comes from Seagal doesn’t it, the “real” father of MMA!)

Ron Kruck with Cain Velasquez

Cain fights Junior Dos Santos in the rubber match for the UFC World title this Fall. Kruck asks if this is one of the great trilogies in MMA like Liddell-Couture. Cain thinks so. They match up well and on the first night he wasn’t 100% mentally and physically. The second fight was a tough fight even though it was one-sided and he expects a much tougher bout. He tries to approach this as a whole new fight. He understands JDS’ game plan and probably won’t change his either. But now he has to anticipate something new. Despite this being his third fight with JDS, it’s easy to get motivated for this fight as there’s a lot at stake and he is worthy of another title shot so he’s taking this very seriously.

He doesn’t do anything weird with the belts. The one he won from Brock Lesnar is hanging in his office, but the one he won over Junior Dos Santos is on the floor of his closet, but he doesn’t wear it to his daughter’s school or at restaurants. He doesn’t like attention in public.

He feels he could go through a run as lengthy and dominant like Anderson Silva and GSP, but he has to win the fights and that’s what he’s here to do.

Another boxing champ in MMA

They show clips of past boxing champions in MMA like Ray Mercer’s infamous KO of Tim Sylvia and James Toney’s unsuccessful fight with Randy Couture. We now see Ricardo Mayorga at weigh-ins, who looked totally awesome in full matador regalia for his staredown with Rene Martinez. Great charisma, great spectacle. The former boxing champ (last fight was a loss to Miguel Cotto) stepped into the cage for En Vivo for a 175 pound fight. Mayorga actually got a guillotine but it was reversed and Martinez put one on and Mayorga had to tap to be 0-1 in MMA.

Friday Finishes

--Miranda Cayabyab finished Angela Hill with an overhand to the jaw at Lion Fights

--Niko Ruiz finished DJ Miller with a left kick to the face, also at Lion Fights

--Takuya Eizumi finished Teppei Masuda with an armbar at Pancrase from Japan

Ray Sefo LIVE

The K-1 veteran superstar turned WSOF President is back fighting MMA against Dave Huckaba (along the lines of Vince McMahon vs. Steve Austin.) The Samoan joins us on the big screen from the Xtreme Couture gym in Las Vegas. (His Presidency of the WSOF is not at stake for this bout however.)

One of his goals in life was to get to one hundred fights, but one of his coaches in New Zealand recently pointed out this will actually be 101, not 100. There was talk about him fighting in WSOF before they even had their first show, but now its reality and Huckaba is the real deal.

He’s put in a strong camp and he’s ready to go. Bas marvels at how healthy Sefo is despite a long K-1 career which is typically so injury-prone. Sefo says he’s always in the gym anyway and lives there. Getting into the rhythm of his camp was tough the first couple weeks but since then it’s been fine and he feels good. He started out at 273 and is down to 257. He’s strong and fast and ready.

He doesn’t watch a ton of video on opponents typically. He knows Huckaba is a big guy who likes to throw down and is not a pushover. No matter how great you are, one mistake can end it, so he knows that and he will be ready to throw down. (As President he should do the right thing for business and do the job.)

MMA Rule Update

Since you cannot kick or knee a “downed” opponent, when in a vulnerable position some fighters would place a finger or hand on the mat as a “defense” since the hand/finger would legally make you a “downed” opponent, even though you’re not actually on the mat which is the spirit of the rule. A rule change has been recently proposed to stop this tactic, and the change is that the referee should determine in the fight if they are putting a finger or hand on the mat is doing it to as a mere defense to getting kicked. (Bad idea to leave it to the referee, opens up way too much opportunity for controversy and severe injury. Finalize the rule, don’t leave it up to the refs.)

President of the American Boxing Commission Tim Lueckenhoff says they are trying to prevent the “cat and mouse” up and down game to prevent fouls. Bernie Profato from Ohio’s commission says they are trying to prevent this by letting the fighters know in advance that they know what they are doing and want to stop this. (I remember Rich Franklin suggested this defense back in the Hughes-Franklin TUF for one of his fighters, and Matt Serra didn’t understand the rule or the defense and blew up about it.)

Bas says his counter to that was when his opponent was facelocked, he would lift him up so his hand would be off the mat then he’d knee him in the face! They show a clip of Jon Dodson using that tactic in his fight with Demetrious Johnson who had Dodson locked up against the face attempting knees.

Ron Kruck with Rowdy Ronda

Ronda says the highlight of being a coach was forging relationships with the kids on her team. She still communicates with many of the fighters. She describes her team as the meanest but most affectionate.

The most difficult part of shooting the season was having to restrain herself all the time since she couldn’t say everything she wanted with the cameras always on and since Tate aggravates her so much and she legally can’t do anything about it. (They show a great clip of Ronda walking by Tate in the hallway hating her so much.)

She’s on the September cover of Maxim, and is happy to do Expendables 3 and “Mr. Stallone” has been very supportive. She was very excited to meet Stallone and can’t believe it’s him when she talks to him since she’s watched Rocky so many times and they have posters all over their gym. At some point he figures it’ll be normal with him but in the meantime it’s significant to be with her idol.

She didn’t get along with Tate before TUF and the season just made things worse. She respects her as a fighter and athlete, but as a person they will never be making cupcakes together. Their personalities just don’t mix yet she honestly believes if her boyfriend (Bryan Caraway) wasn’t around they might actually get along.

She gets equal enjoyment from any win, but if Miesha got hurt, she’d just go eat some buffalo wings and not even think about it twice.

She wants to fight Cyborg one day but doesn’t think she’s making any effort to make that happen. It is not coincidence that the day after the UFC announces out of competition drug testing that Cyborg asked for her release to fight Invicta, when UFC was going to let her fight Invicta anyway. She doesn’t want to get tested, and they even paid nutritionists to show that she could make 135 safely easily, but they don’t want to do it. It’s a factor of pride since she knows she’d get beat.

WTF?!

They show a graphic pointing out how judges in fights from the UFC on FOX show were completely opposite with one judge awarding all three rounds to Yves Edwards, while the other two judges had all three rounds fro Daron Cruickshank which is a rather large disparity. And the same thing happened with the Ed Herman-Trevor Smith bout although the third judge only had Herman 2 rounds to 1, the other judges were complete opposite on all three rounds!